Posted on September 24, 2013 under Storytelling with no comments yet

“Chestnuts roasting on an open fire …” The Christmas Song by Mel Torme

Our town is blessed with an abundance and variety of trees.  So it comes as no surprise that many streets are named after them, like in so many other towns and cities across the land.  We have Elm, Pine, Chestnut, Spruce Lane, Maple and Hawthorne, just to name a few.

Several years ago, the dreaded Dutch elm disease tore through the area and many of the majestic elms had to be levelled, several of them at the golf course.  I remember this well as there was one particular elm on the fourth hole that seemed to attract my drive like a magnet.  One day I was playing with my father-in-law and sure enough, my drive came to rest at the base of the tree approximately 190 yards from the hole.  I was stymied and there was no possible way of advancing the ball without cutting down the tree.

This hole was a par four.  Passing by, on an adjacent hole, was a friend who commented that getting a birdie on the hole would be challenging to say the least.  As he watched, I took a one stroke penalty for an unplayable lie, dropped the ball and lofted my third shot directly into the hole.  I don’t know who was more shocked.  Later that fall, the maintenance crew levelled the tree.  My father in law gathered up a huge slice of it and presented it to me at Christmas.  I had it made into a small end table and although cracked and worn, like its owner, it remains upright and a conversation piece.

The other day I bumped into a friend who lives on Chestnut Street. He has resided on that lovely, secluded side street for over forty years.  He was telling me that when he and his wife first moved to the street, there wasn’t a chestnut tree to be found, which struck them as odd.  So, they decided to take matters into their own hands.

They did some research and gathered up some chestnuts from a tree situated near the cathedral.  They nurtured and germinated them during the winter months and the following spring, planted seedlings in various locations on their property and the surrounding area.  Voila!  If you drive over to Chestnut Street today, you will find lots of chestnut trees.

The neighborhood kids got to experience the thrill of picking up the chestnuts with their prickly outer coating and turning them into exotic necklaces.

In the ensuing years, their children have taken some of the chestnuts and planted them in far flung locations like Georges River in Cape Breton and as far away as Ottawa and Vancouver.  These trees have taken root and now bear fruit.  Talk about expanding the family tree.

And speaking of family trees, I shook ours the other day and a few nuts fell out.  Unfortunately they weren’t chestnuts.

Posted on September 23, 2013 under Monday Morning Musings with one comment

I spent a pleasant morning at the Farmer’s Market on Saturday shamelessly promoting our big fundraiser coming up this  Thursday, Sept.26th. at 7:00 p.m. at the Schwartz Auditorium. I certainly don’t want to create pandemonium by suggesting that we are going to have a sell out , causing you to make a mad dash for tickets. However, in terms of planning for coffee and tea at the intermission, it would be great if we had a good handle on numbers so please try and buy your tickets in advance. In addition to strong advance ticket sales, we have already received one anonymous donation of $1000 from someone who can’t make it to the show but who wanted to support the cause. Phil and I are both getting very excited about the event. Terrified would be another word to describe our feelings.

I was delivering ticket proceeds to the treasurer of St. Vincent de Paul last week. He lives on Chestnut Street. Well, one thing led to another and he told me this story about when he first arrived on the street. At that time, despite the name, there were no chestnut trees on Chestnut Street. So he and his wife took matters into their own hands. If you go there today you will see several chestnut trees adorning their property and those around them. I decided to write a story about this which is titled : A Family Tree. Coming soon.

In addition to my editorial team ( makes me sound important…don’t be fooled ) and the web designing wizardry of Crispin Cornect  ( new website coming soon ), I have added a consultant from Ontario to my growing list of advisors. We are collectively trying to nail down the final pieces to get my book ready for printing in late October. There’s a lot more to this than meets the eye. As it turns out, writing the stories is the easy part. We are going to try and market the book beyond the borders of Antigonish and to do this we need to use every weapon in the arsenal. We will do all of the traditional stuff by having a launch and selling hard copies but we want to be able to sell the book anywhere. To do this we need to use social media and all that that entails. If you are curious about the title, go to my website and check out the tab “My First Book.”

Have a great week and hope to see you at the big event on Thursday.

Posted on September 21, 2013 under Storytelling with one comment

We don’t think much about our home furnishings unless the pets have torn them to shreds and replacement is inevitable.  The most likely time to replace furniture is when we are moving to a new home or apartment and a change of décor is in order.  Some furniture is special and will follow you forever.  However, there is one iconic item that always poses special challenges in good times and bad, and that is the piano.

For many homes in our part of the world, the piano was the centrepiece of the living room, if not the entire house.  Long before the advent of television and the internet, the piano was the primary source of entertainment for a whole generation of our ancestors.  A good fiddle player and an accomplished sidekick on the piano could entertain the entire neighborhood well into the night.  The other part of that winning combination was often alcohol and tobacco.

Most pianos I have seen are the garden variety and a few were even less so.  I remember in my youth that a few of us, living in Victoria at the time, pooled our meagre resources and bought a piano for less than $100.  I don’t think it was a Steinway.  More like a beer stein.  Somehow my sister could miraculously get a tune out of it.  And the more we partied, the better it sounded.  You know how that goes.  One fateful night, at the end of our tenure on the west coast, the piano met its sorry end when we had our own version of a beach party.  I can still see water pouring off of the top of the piano down onto the white ivories.

And some residences are home to “grand” and “baby grand” pianos.  These are magnificent works of art and can produce amazing sounds at the fingertips of masterful classical music types.

But in all cases, there comes a time that you have to relocate the damn piano and that’s where the fun starts.

It’s tough enough to decide what to do in good times with a piano but throw in an impending divorce and things can get dicey.

Take the couple who were going through the delicate task of dividing their assets.  Things were progressing until it came to valuing the magnificent upright grand that graced their elegant living room.  Having reached an impasse they agreed to auction it off and split the proceeds.

Four burly characters arrived on their doorstep on the appointed day and carefully transported the piano to the auction house.

A few weeks later a notice appeared in the local paper about a block of items coming up for auction.  The former owner of the piano, who happened to be interested in antiques, decided to go and check it out.  To his surprise, his very own piano was among the items on the block that day.  The bidding started and on this day it appeared that no one was interested in the piano so just for fun he threw in a stinker bid of $300.  “Going once, going twice.  Sold!”

He handed his ex $150 on the day she vacated the house for the last time; her share of the piano proceeds.

A few days later, four burly men from the auction house showed up at the same house from which they had removed the piano a few weeks earlier.  They seemed perplexed as they moved the piano back into the exact location from whence it had come a short time ago.

He sat and pondered the 52 white keys and 36 black.  He thought of playing Beethoven but instead chose the Everly Brothers as he hammered out the first notes of “Bye Bye Love.”